Chapter Twenty-One

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Evangeline was done for. Well and truly so.

It'd been two days since she'd been with Gage, and she was still sore. Despite the duke's protestations to the contrary, he was not a man of average size, and she had the tender lady bits to prove it. She'd moved gingerly around the house and had to lie to Viola that she'd injured herself riding. Though not technically a lie. She had just ridden an uncommonly large mount with a very large… pommel.

She let out a mortified giggle-snort.

To top things off, as she'd discovered in such an untimely manner when they'd arrived in his bedchamber, she was ninety-nine percent sure she was falling in love with him. The remaining one percent was the only actual part of her brain that seemed to still be in working order and was painfully aware that falling for the man was a guaranteed trip to heartbreak. Gage was returning to Scotland; she was going to be focused on her shelter. On the future she wanted.

The one she'd always wanted.

But no matter what she did, Evangeline couldn't stop thinking about him. Fantasizing about him and some alternate version of what could be, in which their liaison was something real. Wondering if he hadn't worn a protective sheath what their children would look like. Why on earth was she thinking about children ? Especially bright-eyed, red-haired offspring with cheeky grins? Maybe they would have ice-blue eyes like hers. Or green eyes with blond hair.

Stop.

She had to stop. She couldn't stop.

Which was why she found herself in a hackney at midnight, dressed in a dark cloak that covered her from head to toe and en route to the duke's residence.

You will be caught.

No, she was being extra careful.

You are wearing nothing under this cloak.

That was indeed a fact.

You are a desperate, besotted fool.

This was also true.

"Is your master at home?" she asked when she was deposited at the duke's home and greeted by a handsome young man who wasn't the duke. She faltered and almost turned back around. He didn't look like a liveried servant either. "Who are you?"

"Jenkins, my lady, the footman, er, the butler," he stammered, going red. "And I'm sorry, but His Grace is not home to callers."

Evangeline frowned, wondering if she'd made a horrible mistake by showing up so boldly without invitation. She did not need the gossip to spread of anyone knowing that a lady of quality had visited the duke unaccompanied in the middle of the night. "I'm not a lady and he will be at home to me." She fought back a semi-hysterical snicker. "Please inform him that Miss Philergood is here."

"I beg your pardon, miss? Fila-who?"

"Phil-er-good," she enunciated with half a snicker that threatened to spawn more snorts, only to catch sight of a very rumpled-looking duke himself at the top of the staircase. He was staring at her with an unreadable expression on his handsome face.

He descended, and every step he took made her breath catch. He was, indeed, not dressed for callers, in a linen shirt and trousers with a banyan thrown carelessly over the top of it, and scandalously bare feet. He looked delicious .

"Thank you, Jenkins," he rumbled. "That will be all."

"Yes, Your Grace." The butler nodded and disappeared, not seeming to care that his master wasn't dressed or was breaking all kinds of rules by welcoming her. It was decidedly odd, but then again, the Duke of Vale wasn't the usual kind of duke.

Nor are you the usual kind of lady , the dreadfully annoying voice in her head reminded her. It wasn't wrong. She made for a rather terrible lady, truth be told.

"I didn't quite get your name," he said softly when he reached the foyer. "Miss Philergood?"

"Miss Philer now ."

His lips twitched, and his eyes went wide at the patently obvious double entendre. Blushing at her flagrancy, Evangeline cleared her throat and walked into the nearest private room she could find, which happened to be empty. "Where's all your furniture?" she asked, knowing the duke had followed her when she heard the snick of the door.

"Renovations," he said. "Is something amiss?"

With a bone-deep shiver at what she was about to do, she shook her head and turned, heart hammering to see him in touching distance. Her hands itched to pull him closer. He was so beautifully disheveled, her sinful mountain of a duke. Instead her fingers went to the ties of her cloak.

She let it fall. "I needed to see you."

Nude, except for her shoes and a pair of black gloves, she cataloged every heartbeat of his reaction, watching him blink in disbelief, those sensuous lips parting on a ragged breath as he took her in, desire flooding those angular cheekbones with a ruddy flush. That telltale muscle flexed to life in his cheek.

"I want you, Gage."

Her voice broke the spell over him. "Dear God, Evangeline, did anyone see you?"

"I took a hansom."

Green eyes glinted with a flash of ire as they swept down her naked body. "Like that ? What were you thinking? What if something had happened? What if the coach wheel had cracked on a cobblestone and you were forced to disembark?"

She slanted him a look. "Contrary to what you might assume about my sex, Duke, I am not an idiot and I do have a pair of working hands to keep my cloak tightly closed." She bit her lip, embarrassment filling her. "This was a bad idea. I shouldn't have come."

"Wait," he said, reaching for her elbow when she knelt to retrieve her belongings. "Yes, you should have. I'm not thinking straight at the moment. That happens when a beautiful woman in the altogether makes all reason fly out the window."

"I wasn't thinking either," she admitted. "I haven't been able to. I cannot even function. I volunteered at the Temporary Home for Lost and Starving Dogs in Holloway yesterday and was sent home because I fed the wrong food to the animals and made quite a mess of things because I was distracted. Me! Distracted!" Evangeline poked at his very firm chest and winced. "And it's… all. Your. Fault." She punctuated the last three words with more poking that turned into a lewd sort of rubbing.

God, he was so hard and muscled everywhere.

"My fault?" he murmured.

She nodded furiously. "We need to get this out of our systems, whatever this is. We need to"—she choked on her own tongue—"fuck it out."

Russet brows shot high, that thick throat of his working. " Fuck it out?"

"Did I stutter, Your Grace?" she asked, and placed a hand directly on him. He was hard as a brick there, too, confirming her suspicion that the Duke of Vale was in as bad a state as she was. "Since you have no furniture, the wall will have to do."

"I've created a monster," he muttered as she unfastened his fly with trembling fingers, freeing him from the confines of his trousers.

"There are worse monsters in the world than me," she replied on a gasp when he positioned himself right where he needed to be. "People who abandon animals. Murderers. Thieves. Philanderers."

"True, though one could argue that giving in to an addiction is monstrous."

"I am not addicted to you." She yanked on his hair, fingernails scraping against his scalp. "Are you planning to moralize all night, Duke? Or will you take me up against that wall?"

"So imperious," he said, one palm banding across the globes of her arse and squeezing. She bit back a moan when the blunt tips of those thick digits ventured perilously close to her damp, aching sex.

"I go after what I want," she whispered. "And I want you. Now, Gage."

Eyes hooded and dark with lust, her obedient duke bent his knees, notched himself at her wet entrance, and slid into her with one powerful upward thrust. They both gasped at the too-tight sensation as she went to her toes. She was more than ready for him, but her body still had to adjust to his girth. The noises that wanted to climb out of her felt obscene when he angled his hips, hoisting her up in one effortless movement, and walked them backward to the wainscoting.

He braced one hand against it for purchase. It didn't take long—a handful of deep, frantic strokes—before pressure began to build in her already oversensitive core, and Evangeline exploded with a muffled cry. The duke wasn't too long after her, holding her up against the wall with one hand while pulling out of her with the other to spend on the polished floor with a groan.

"That was… too quick," he said on a jagged exhale.

"Perfect," she panted. "Hard and fast."

He let her down gently, one leg at a time, eyes searching hers. Heat flooded her face at how wanton she'd been by showing up as she had. What if he'd had company? She hated to think of him entertaining anyone else, especially of the female variety, but he was a man. Now that he'd experienced copulation, perhaps he'd want more of it… from others. And it wasn't as though she had any claim on him. Their arrangement had served its purpose.

Once or twice, she'd told him, if she recalled, and this was the second.

More would only complicate matters.

Keeping her eyes downcast, she moved around him to gather her cloak, a wave of sadness choking her.

"Evangeline?"

Shrugging into the cloak that felt cold on her damp skin, she blew out a breath. "I'm sorry. This was beyond foolish to do this to myself. We're done, Vale."

Before he could even form a reply, she scurried from the room and out the front door, grateful that the hansom she'd paid a small fortune and promised more to wait was still there. The driver snapped to attention the minute she descended the staircase and opened the coach door.

"Thank you for waiting," she said, eyes stinging. Hell, she would not cry.

"Shall I deliver you where I picked you up, miss?" he asked, eyes brightening when she handed him a fat coin purse with the promised remainder.

Evangeline nodded, her throat tight. When she glanced up through the narrow, grimy window, she could make out the huge frame of the duke crowding the doorway, his face grim. A frown marred his brow, his lips pulled tight in displeasure, but he made no move to stop the coach or come after her. He wouldn't. Vale knew too well that she was a woman of her own mind. She hated being coddled, though at the moment some comfort wouldn't go amiss.

It was her own damned fault.

She was the one who had created a monster, not him. And now she was wrecked because of it. In truth, she wanted nothing more than for him to come after her. To hold her. To show her everything would be well, that she wasn't alone in the vulnerability she felt… that letting him in and letting herself love was what he wanted as well.

She wanted… God , she didn't bloody know what she wanted anymore.

By the time she made it back to her residence, slipping in via the quiet kitchens, tears were running down her cheeks. After a quick wash to scrub away the evidence of her folly, she changed into a night rail and gathered Lucky close. She buried her tearstained face into the pup's fur.

"Oh, Lucky, I've made such a terrible mistake," she whispered. "I thought I could keep my mind clear, but it's gone so muddled. I don't know what I want anymore."

You want Vale.

The dog licked her cheek, huge eyes shining with the unconditional love only an animal could offer. Evangeline bit her lip, her heart aching with the brutal realization of what she could never have—Vale to be hers for good.

Heavens, she was a hundred times the fool.

Gage stared at the beauty in blue across the ballroom, his breath hitching in his lungs. He had no idea why he'd even come, perhaps to punish himself with a glimpse of her. After Evangeline's impromptu visit nine days ago—now well past the six-week period of the agreement he'd made and yet he was still here—she hadn't so much as looked at him even though they'd seen each other several times in public since then.

It was as though she was going out of her way to deliberately ignore and evade him, much like he'd done before, only with a very different motive. She wasn't avoiding him in a ploy to make the heart grow fonder. She was running scared.

We're done, Vale.

He understood her last visit for what it was—one last interlude to say goodbye. She'd been in control until the very last. No strings, no entanglements. No unnecessary feelings.

Gage had convinced himself that the ache in his gut wasn't anything more than fleeting sentiment to a loss. He would get over it. Over her .

Someone sidled up to him, and he looked over, half expecting it to be Lushing. To his surprise, it was the earl's sister, the Duchess of Greydon. "Your Grace," he greeted her.

"Vesper," she said. "I've been Your Graced to death tonight already."

He chuckled. He knew the feeling. One of the consequences of being in town for the season, even if he wasn't actively looking for a wife, was the attention. Too much of it, in fact. Evangeline had been a bit of a buffer from the deadly focus of the many matchmaking mothers, though they had taken notice. Even as an infamous wallflower, she was still the daughter of a respected peer, and Gage held one of the most coveted titles in England. The ton thrived on competition, and he'd become a subject of considerable interest, despite his paltry coffers.

He didn't want their interest.

Gage wanted hers .

"Where's Lushing?" he asked the duchess. "Haven't seen him tonight." Gage frowned. He hadn't seen the earl in a week or so actually, and it wasn't like Lushing to miss a party.

"Our father has taken a turn for the worse," Vesper said, grief thickening her voice. "He and his solicitor have called Jasper in to discuss provisions."

"I'm so sorry."

The duchess gave a sad shrug. "Papa's been sick for a long while. We have been prepared, though my brother has taken it harder than expected." She sighed. "You know how he is. Pretending life is this brilliant, unending bash so he doesn't have to think about reality and the fact that he will be duke when our father dies."

Gage understood that motivation. It was how Asher had been and probably why he and Lushing had become friends in the first place. Free spirits who avoided responsibility at any cost, even at the expense of their own selves. Grief and duty took their pounds of flesh in different ways. Gage made a mental note to call upon his friend sooner rather than later.

"What's going on with you and Effie?" the duchess asked bluntly.

Taken aback, he huffed a breath. "Nothing."

"It doesn't look like nothing," Vesper pointed out and sipped from her glass. "You're like two wolves, circling each other."

It was an apt description. Evangeline would never be prey, his fierce vixen. Gage shrugged, unable to give an answer that wouldn't expose them both. He had no idea whether she had confided in her friend, but he was thinking not.

"I've never seen her like this," Vesper went on. "Withdrawn and fractious. Normally, she's quite even-tempered, even when faced with impossible provocation." Gage glanced at her, but she seemed lost in her thoughts. "Case in point, Lord Huntington approached her earlier with his usual Lady Ghastly fare, and she growled at him to take his puny, sniveling arse back to the hole he crawled from."

A laugh burst from him. "She did?"

"The Effie I know would have smiled, flayed him with her eyes, and walked away." The duchess narrowed her gaze on him. "What have you done to her?"

"Me?" He laughed harder. "How is her standing up for herself my doing? That woman has a backbone of pure, unyielding steel. Trust me, Lady Evangeline doesn't need anyone's help, least of all mine." His voice softened, pride filling him. "She is a force beyond anyone I have ever met."

The look Vesper shot him made his skin itch. A knowing, contemplative look. "She is, isn't she? Then why haven't you asked her to dance?"

"If I could, I would. But she's been avoiding me all evening."

She looped her arm in his. "Then come with me."

Gage could barely resist, and although she was a slip of a thing, and pregnant, she was strong and resolute. He did not want to accost Evangeline if she had been making every effort to elude him, but he could not shrug Greydon's duchess off, either, without causing a scene.

People were already staring at the determined duchess dragging a duke that wasn't her own in her wake. The Duke of Greydon lifted an amused brow as they stalked past, and shook his head when Gage shot him a beseeching look.

Powerless, he let himself be led, watching Evangeline's pale blue eyes widen the closer they got. He saw the scowl just as she shifted right behind a small crowd. Instead of following, Vesper yanked him to the left.

"Oh, no you don't, you sneaky little imp," she muttered to herself.

"Vesper," Gage protested. "She doesn't want—"

Vesper shushed him. "She doesn't know what she wants. I, however, her best friend in the world, am well aware of how stubborn Effie can be."

Stubborn was an understatement. Gage blinked just as they cornered a flustered, red-cheeked Evangeline in a cerulean dress that brought out the bluer flecks in her eyes. Pink lips parted in shock, guilt flashing across her face as she pinned the bottom one between her teeth. God, she was lovely. Her elegant throat worked, even as she strangled her fan between gloved fingers.

"Got you, wench!" the duchess pronounced in a gratified tone.

" Vesper ," Evangeline hissed. "What are you doing?"

"Saving a duke from pining himself to death."

Gage startled. "I was doing nothing of the sort."

Vesper speared him with a stare worthy of the queen herself. "So you weren't holding up a pillar across the ballroom and devouring Effie with your eyes? Much the same as she was doing whenever she thought you weren't looking. You could fill a pond with all the combined drool."

"I was not!" Evangeline blurted, her cheeks scarlet. "And you're being ridiculous. There was no drool."

Vesper shook her head. "I swear, just watching you two and I'm in an agitated state ! And I'm already pregnant!" She lowered her voice. "If I weren't, I'd be suffering from hypertension of the pelvis."

"Vesper!" Evangeline shrieked, even as Gage gaped. He didn't know whether to guffaw or remove himself from a potentially explosive situation between the two friends. "That's not a thing, and shouldn't you be in your confinement at home , being a dutiful wife and mother-to-be? Haven't you been casting up your accounts willy-nilly over your poor husband?"

The duchess gave an airy shake of her head. "Oh, that was temporary nausea. The doctor says I'm fine now. And don't try to change the subject. What's going on between you two?"

Crystalline eyes met his and slid away. "Nothing."

"That's what he said, but if it's nothing, then why are you trying to run away from each other?" she countered, hands on her hips. Gage moved to shift away, and the duchess's eyes pierced him. "Don't even think about it, you. Something's going on, and I hate being out of the loop. I swear on the baby currently treating my body like its own sporting ground that I will get to the bottom of this."

"Darling," the Duke of Greydon said, finally coming to collect his wife. "Why don't we get you a cool drink?"

Both Gage and Evangeline let out a breath as the duke led his disgruntled duchess away. Craning around her husband, Vesper lifted two fingers to her eyes and then pointed at them in turn, and Gage couldn't help releasing a chuckle.

"She's relentless," he murmured.

Evangeline nodded. "Worse now that she's with child."

He cleared his throat when they stood there after a beat in awkward silence. "How have you been?"

"Good."

"That's good," he said. A smile touched her lips, and he followed her stare to see her younger sister twirling past with Dawson, all smiles. "Things look good there, too."

Dear God, did he have any other word other than good in his vocabulary? He felt unnaturally tongue-tied in her company, as if the wrong word would send her fleeing from him, and heaven help him if he didn't want to keep her close for as long as he could. Her sweet scent curled around him, and he forced himself not to audibly inhale.

"He approached my father last week for Viola's hand," Evangeline said. "Their engagement will be announced in the Times tomorrow."

"That's"— don't say good —"excellent."

Her shoulder lifted in his peripheral vision. His heart trembled at the difficulty of speech—ease of conversation had never been a problem between them. He'd always been able to tell her everything. Well, almost everything. Lately, Huntington had been off licking his wounds, but Gage didn't care. His failure to woo Viola wasn't part of their deal, thank goodness.

Gage couldn't be held responsible for the man's inadequacies, and if the cad chose to renege on their agreement, Gage had no problem taking the matter to court. Not that he would, for Evangeline's sake, but he suspected that Huntington, or better yet the man's father, would not appreciate any of that kind of scandal.

But he did intend to confess everything to Evangeline. Now wasn't the time, but she deserved the whole truth.

He cleared his throat. "Would you like to dance?"

Evangeline turned to him, her heart in her eyes for a moment before it was hidden from view. "Vale—"

"Gage," he corrected, needing to hear her say it, even if this was the last time he might hold her in his arms.

"Gage then."

"I want to start over," he said softly. "If our arrangement has made me realize anything, it's that I've never felt this way about anyone. You make me laugh, Evangeline. You make me see the world in a way I never had before. You make me want to dance at balls, to let the world know I'm with you and only with you." He breathed out, watching her expressions—the desire, the need, the helpless yearning—all echoed by him. "Please. Let me court you properly."

"You wish to court me?" she asked, voice shaky.

I wish to love you as boldly as you deserve. But it was much too soon to confess that.

Gage's heart swelled so much his chest felt a hundred sizes too small. "If you'll let me, I promise to do it right. Dinners, more than three dances, all my evenings, every one of my hours. No secrets, no more furtive meetings."

"Don't sell yourself too short, Your Grace. Perhaps one or two furtive meetings," she said, a hint of a smile hovering on her lips.

Hope bloomed. "You're it for me, Evangeline. And I'm sorry I was too afraid to make my feelings clear. I was scared you wouldn't want more." He paused, his breath stuttering. "But you do, don't you? Because it's all I desire."

Light glimmered in her gaze as she moistened her lips, but before she could reply, a loud, obnoxious voice cut between them.

"You thought you could make a fool of me, did you, Vale?" Huntington bellowed. "Everyone's talking about Lady Viola's rejection and I'm a laughingstock!"

Evangeline turned her head with curiosity. Cold slipped through Gage's ribs in anticipation of a blow that he knew would be catastrophic, should it fall… once the sotted lord revealed his secrets. Gage's darkest secrets. "You're in your cups, Huntington," he said, attempting to steer him away and avoid disaster. "Let's take this outside."

The fop scowled, shrugging his arm off. "I didn't pay you to seduce Lady Ghastly so that her sister could get herself betrothed to someone else."

Huntington's misleading words were deliberately insulting and incendiary, and there was no defense when the utter silence in the wake of that statement was damning. Gage opened his mouth and closed it. He didn't have a single breath in his lungs to combat the instant feeling of suffocation. His gaze slid to Evangeline.

An enraged, ice-blue gaze met his. "He paid you to seduce me?"

"No, it wasn't like that," he bit out, feeling every bit of the trust and rapport he'd built with her, and all of the precious ground he'd gained moments before slipping through his grasp. "He didn't pay me to do anything of the sort."

"So you didn't accept money from him?"

"No. Yes. I mean, it was an agreement to resolve my brother's debt at first. It was only supposed to be six weeks." From the affronted, pained look on her face, he was failing abominably. "It was before I knew you, Evangeline. Before I discovered how compassionate you were or how very much you loved your shelter animals, and how that heart of yours is so extraordinarily large that a lowly rat might deserve as much care as any other." He exhaled, tripping over his words, horribly aware of their audience but not stopping. "I learned how brave you were, and so deeply intelligent that your beautiful brain could rival the greatest thinkers of our time. Your devotion to your family and friends alone are testament to your strength of character." Gage sucked in a shallow sip of air, feeling her slip away with each second. "You inspire me, Evangeline, every single day that I am lucky to know you to be a better man. To be worthy of you." Her eyes fluttered shut, agony tightening her features. God, he was losing her. "I meant what I said, you're it for me."

Her hurt was tangible, obvious in her clenched jaw and too-pale cheeks, but her chin jerked high. She opened her eyes and regarded him down the length of her nose, irises like chips of ice, a winter queen in all her regal, glacial glory. "Then I'm delighted to be of service, Your Grace. I hope you got your money's worth."

Desperation bled through him, even as hope fled. "Evangeline, please. Wait. I fell in love with you."

She flinched as though he'd struck her a fatal blow, fingers fisting at her sides. Eyes blazing, she wavered on her feet as if she was fighting with herself before she stepped tantalizingly close, rose to her toes, and whispered in his ear, "No, Your Grace. You fucked me. Don't confuse that with love. I won't."

With that, she turned and left, taking everything that meant anything at all with her.